“Are you afraid?”
“Yes, a little. Why do you ask?”
“You’re shivering.”
Pausing for a moment to consider this, Jos found it was true and wondered why - this place was probably the warmest on the ship. Still, he pulled his cloak tighter and gritted his teeth.
They walked on long-bladed grass that crunched delightfully at every step. Jos could barely remember the last time he had walked on grass - the smell was magical.
A sudden stampede of memory threatened to overwhelm him - everything came back so clearly. He could see the swings he had played on as a child - they were red, with black seats, high enough off the ground that he had felt really grown-up to sit on them and swing into the air. He had swung and dreamt of flying, of reaching to the heavens, of becoming a pilot of a ship to the stars. He played on the slide and the roundabout, on the see-saw and the climbing frame that was shaped like an elephant’s head. He played and he smelled the grass beneath his feet, fresh with frost or dew. Ghosts of children played across his eyes, walking the paths beside him, laughing and shrieking with equal glee, climbing the tall oak trees to his left, the beech trees to the right, sitting beneath a gnarled, old willow. For a moment he could see everything. Then he was back.
“It’s okay to be frightened,” Jonah said, in what Jos could only assume was supposed to be a comforting tone of voice - Jonah did not comfort well.
“Thank you but I don’t really need your permission. Some deranged terrorists are trying to destroy the ship and I’m trying to stop them. Every security guard on the ship is looking for us - and will probably shoot us on sight given that their boss seems to be behind it all. And here we are, strolling through a park…”
“An arboretum,” Jonah corrected him, almost sheepishly, “it’s an arboretum.”
“… strolling through an arboretum as if it were a Sunday afternoon and we hadn’t a care in the world. I think I have earned the right to be a little scared.”
“Yes, you have,” said Jonah, “my apologies.”
Jos looked at Jonah to see if he was being genuine. Something had changed about him since the engine room, and Jonah seemed more distant and vague, as if a mist had sealed him off from the world. He walked as if a huge burden rested on his shoulders, dragging him down. Was it guilt? They had not been able to stop the bomb from detonating and Jonah must have tried damn hard. It hadn’t been enough. The ship was one step closer to disaster, though what that disaster exactly was Jos still did not know.
They walked in silence for a few moments.
“It’s really beautiful here,” Jos said, trying to lighten the tone, “I can hardly believe we’re still on the ship.”
It was the sky that did it. Above them was a perfect sky, blue, pure and unscarred. A sun beat down upon them, hot and heavy. It was almost midday and in the arboretum it was always summer. Staring up at the sky, Jos found it hard to believe that it was all an illusion. He knew the sky and its powerful sun were nothing but a projector screen, and that the roof lay only fifty metres above his head. He knew all of that yet could not see it.
“Yes, it is very beautiful here,” Jonah agreed sadly. “Beautiful and false. What have we done to our world?”
“That’s progress I guess. At least we have something to remember it all by. Not everything has been lost.”
“To remember it by… Yes, that’s what this place is. A memorial, a mausoleum, an epitaph on a long-forgotten tombstone. No one has been here for days, Josiah, and do you know why?”
Jos shook his head.
“It’s because no one cares to remember. It is easier to forget than to be faced with the beauty we have lost. And I don’t just mean here and now, in this place. Everywhere I look I see that the past is forgotten, as if every day occurs in isolation, with no connection to what came before or what must come after. Just look at Canary Wharf. It is as if we cannot bear to remember our mistakes. Memory is both powerful and dangerous.”
They walked in silence for a few steps. It was the silence that revealed the deception - there were no birds, no insects, only the silent plants, revelling in a false-paradise.
“I understand that memory is important - vital, even - but dangerous?”
“Don’t underestimate the power of the human mind, Josiah Smith. The human mind has mapped the heavens, shaped the world. It has grasped the infinite and tamed the wild. It can peer into the distant past or pierce the unknown future. It has touched the divine and reached the depths of depravity. Nothing is beyond its grasp.”
Jos shivered again. Not even the bright sunshine could clear his thoughts now. He had hoped that in this place he could forget about the outside world and his troubles for a time but Jonah had shattered the illusion of safety. They had to reach the bridge, the only place they could really find out what was going on now that the engine room had been wrecked. This was the fastest route but right now it didn’t seem fast enough. He stepped up the pace.
What was that? Out of the corner of his eye, Jos thought he saw someone, or something, moving in the shadows of one of the trees. He looked again. It seemed to be a short, balding man, skin turning to wrinkles, wearing small, round spectacles on the edge of his nose. He saw this man for a moment and then he was gone. There was no one there at all. Jos shook his head and dismissed the experience.
When this was all over he would take Ammi to a place like this, he would tell her that he loved her, that he wanted to be with her, that he wanted a second chance. She would understand, wouldn’t she? Understand and forgive him. How much longer could he waste his life?
The old pain of frustration hit him like a sledgehammer. It ought to have worked! That was the maddening stupidity of the thing. Every calculation he made said that it ought to work but it didn’t. It was infuriating, maddening! In years gone by he might have asked some of his colleagues for help but not anymore. Someone would steal the idea and pass it off as their own, someone would solve the power problem before him and then they would take all the credit - history would remember some nobody as the inventor of the time machine. Jos couldn’t allow that to happen. It was a terrible situation but he simply could not trust anyone anymore, not even his fellow lecturers at the university. For all he knew, someone else could be stuck on the very same problem, building their own version. Well, good luck to them. If they finished it first they deserved all the credit they got. What was he but a failure, anyway?
“Ah! My good friend!” bellowed a voice from just behind him.
He turned around, startled, and his eyes were greeted by a behemoth of a man, with a vast, round face and small, dark eyes. His white clothes were utterly spotless. Even his shoes were free from any speck of dirt or dust.
“Why, you must introduce me to your companion! It would be rude not to!”
Jos realised the man was talking to him and then remembered a breakfast he had had what seemed like a thousand years ago. Of all the people to meet in the arboretum! He really didn’t need this.
“Look, I’m really very busy,” he muttered but the elephant-man would have none of it.
“Nonsense! Who could be busy on a fine day like this?”
Jos looked at Jonah for some support but a glazed look had come over his eyes. Wasn’t everyone supposed to be in their cabins? He was sure that Major Cassandra had announced a lock-down.
“We’re leaving,” announced Jos, turning to walk away.
The big man blocked their path.
“No you’re not! Don’t think you can scurry away like a filthy rat! I know who you are!”
Jos had had enough of this man’s ramblings. Thinking fast, he picked up a pile of dirt from the ground and threw it at his white trousers. All colour drained from the man-mountain’s already pale face. He blinked twice and looked at his trousers in shocked disbelief. His lips started twitching and his throat made incoherent noises but they were unable to coordinate their efforts to produce words. Jonah winked at him and they dashed off together. The man found his voice:
“I have never…! How, how could you? How could you!? That’s it! I’m leaving! I don’t need to stand here and have filth hurled at me. How could you!”
But Jos wasn’t listening.
“Jonah! We have to get to the bridge.”
“Yes, yes I know” he said weakly, “Let’s get moving, come on.”
He stepped forward but there was a distant look in his eyes, as if he was already picturing their failure.
Was it just his imagination or was it getting colder in here? And darker too. A heavy, grey cloud had drifted in front of the sun and the temperature seemed to be plummeting. Why was it suddenly so cold?
“Come on Jonah, let’s get out of here.”
“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” Jonah replied absently, dragging his feet as he walked.
Which way was the exit? He couldn’t remember which direction they had been walking in. There was that beech tree, over there, and that had been by the entrance. Or was it the beech on the other side? Jos looked back and forth but couldn’t tell. Where was the exit?
“Jonah! Which way?”
“Um. Over there,” he murmured, “I think.”
It was better than nothing at least, so Jos struck out in the vague direction that Jonah had pointed in.
Suddenly, the huge man loomed into view once more, almost barrelling the two of them over.
“Get out of my way you clumsy fools! You almost stained my jacket!” He began brushing down his clothes vigourously, blocking their path.
Jos moved round him and tried to carry on to their destination.
“Oh hello there,” came a twittering voice, “it’s so good to see you again, this has been such a long trip and really rather boring, if you don’t mind me saying, isn’t it a lovely day out today? Perfectly marvellous as far as I’m concerned, now I know what you’re thinking, what is an ugly girl like me doing with such a dashing figure as this, well if you must know…”
“I don’t need to know!” shouted Jos angrily, recognising the dyed-blonde hair and wide, red mouth of the Venus fly-trap. “I could not care less!”
“Well, there’s no need to get so angry about it,” she continued, lips flapping up and down, still blocking his path, “if you aren’t interested you only have to say so, I’m not stupid, I can take a hint, you know. After all, what would be the point in talking if no one wanted to hear what you were saying?”
“Get out the way!” shouted a voice that Jos was surprised to hear was not his own. He had been about to say the same words himself but it was Jonah that spoke them.
As the wind picked up pace, Jonah’s red hair was blowing madly around his face, his blue eyes suddenly burned with certain fury. He shoved the woman backwards. Jos didn’t think he had pushed her that violently but she went flying. She landed on the ground with a thud, catching herself with her gloved left hand.
“Now you have done us both an injury!” shouted the elephant-man. “No gentleman would push a lady! Try picking on someone your own size!”
Jos watched the Venus fly-trap pick herself off the floor. Her left arm was twisted into a strange angle - it was obviously broken - and yet she seemed to feel no pain at all. All she did was stare at it in disbelief, as if she had never seen it before.
Jonah turned his furious stare on the huge man beside him. Despite their relative sizes, it was Jonah who seemed the larger. The man-mountain backed away slowly, wiping down his clothes as he went.
It was really cold in here now. The wind cut through Jos’ cloak like a knife, chilling him despite the layers he wore. His teeth began to chatter uncontrollably. Jonah just stood there - totally oblivious.
“Jonah! We have to get out of here. Remember? Jonah?”
“Yes, yes. Of course I remember. I’m not stupid.”
He marched away, Jos following behind. He had seen something in Jonah’s eyes that he did not like - bewilderment. Jonah had been so sure of everything but now…
Jos pulled his cloak tightly about himself but it didn’t stop him from shivering. He was too old for this sort of thing. Why had he even thought he could be a hero?
Then Jonah collided with thin air and fell to the ground. What the hell? Jos walked forwards slowly, arms outstretched. His fingertips met something solid.
“Jonah, are you alright? I think you found the wall.”
Groggily, Jonah rose to his feet, and looked at the air confusedly.
The wall was designed to give the illusion of open space. Normally, however, there was supposed to be some kind of warning before you walked into it - a flashing light or flickering colours, so you can tell the real from the false, but no such sign had been given. It looked so real that Jonah had simply walked into it.
“Come on,” Jos said urgently, “if we follow this wall around we’ll come to the exit. Come on, let’s go.”
He held one hand out against the wall and started walking around. Jonah followed vacantly - he looked decidedly unwell and Jos had no idea what to do. Maybe he was really ill, dying even. What could they do without giving themselves up? But if they did then what difference would it make. Soon they would all be dead anyway.
He watched his fingers turn blue with a morbid fascination. It was so cold in here! He tried wrapping his hand in his clothes but it didn’t help. In the end, he stuck his hand firmly in his pocket, and walked with only his elbow against the wall. Even now he couldn’t see it.
Every breath turned into a billow of smoke, rising from their mouths and floating upwards towards the false heaven, before the roaring wind tossed it aside. Jos shivered violently, his teeth clashing together. The exit had to be around here somewhere.
A few moments later, the heavens opened and snow began to fall - not picturesquely, like in a film or on a greetings card, but violently, as if the sky were hurling every snowflake with fury.
Jos could barely see anything. Suddenly he was lost in a world of black and white, of whirling snow and looming shadows.
“Jonah!” he called, raising his voice above the wind, “keep your arm against the wall! We’re nearly there!”
At least he hoped they were nearly there. How much farther could there be to go? He turned around to try and see Jonah and thought he caught a glimpse of him, moving jerkily, like an insect, through the snow. No, it didn’t look like him. It was hard to see anything in this - his eyes kept playing tricks on him. No, definitely not him. There he was, just behind, stumbling a little but keeping his arm on the wall. Come on! Where was the exit?!
Then his elbow went over a groove or perhaps an indentation in the wall. He stopped walking and reached out to touch the air - it felt like metal. It was the door! Just then his feet stepped onto gravel - it was the path that they had abandoned when they entered the arboretum - it felt like coming home.
“Jonah! This is it! We found it!”
Why was it so cold in here? It didn’t make sense but Jos couldn’t think. They had found the door in time. Had Jonah heard? He sent a thought command to the door.
‘Open’
Nothing happened.
‘OPEN’
Still nothing happened. The snow had covered his hair, his clothes were now entirely white. His hands were so cold he could barely feel them.
“Come on!” he shouted, kicking the door in his frustration
The air split open as the doors slid back. The strip-lights were a pleasure to behold and Jos half-walked, half-fell out of the arboretum, breathing hard as he lay on the floor. The doors slid shut behind him. Jonah! He needn’t have worried, Jonah was lying beside him, forcing breaths down his throat like a man half-drowned. They were out! They had made it! The snow was already beginning to melt. As soon as they were recovered they would…
Cold metal pressed into Jos’ neck.
“Look what I found,” sneered a deep male voice.
Jos’ heart sank into his feet. The game was up - they had been caught.
“Get up,” a woman said, “both of you.”
Jos climbed rather unsteadily to his feet. The arboretum had hardly been a walk in the park. What a time to be making puns. His line of thought amazed him.
Jonah was still lying on the floor, straining to breathe.
“You! I’m talking to you. Get up!”
Jos looked at their captors. The man was nearly two metres tall, quite thin but seemed well-built in his heavy armour. His visor was up, revealing almost ice-white skin beneath. There were two women - one dark skinned, the other with almost pointed ears.
“Can’t you see he’s sick?” Jos protested.
“He’d better hope he’s dying,” said the dark-skinned woman.
“Or dead,” said the other.
“Come on, get up!” shouted the pale man, nudging Jonah with his foot.
Moving almost faster than Jos could follow, Jonah leapt into the air. As he span around and kicked the gun across the corridor he seemed to be almost dancing.
“What the…” began the guard but he never got to finish.
As fast as a scorpion sting Jonah smashed his hand into the pale face, driving shards of bone into his brain. Blood spurted everywhere as the guard collapsed.
The two women had been too stunned to react for the first instant but they soon overcame their shock. The one holding Jos hurled him to the floor as they both drew their guns and fired. Somehow, they both missed as Jonah span away and darted down the corridor. Jos thought he caught a glimpse of a devilish smile and blue eyes that burned once more as he disappeared from view.
Then the world began to spin and everything started to fade. The last thing he was aware of was a voice saying:
“This is Unit Fourteen. We are man down, I repeat man down. We have apprehended one suspect but the other is heading starboard down corridor 28. I repeat, the suspect is headed down…”
And then all was black.
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